Written by

Scott Bauer

Associated Press

MADISON — State lawmakers showed little interest Tuesday in revamping the Common Core education standards that have been in place for three years, pushing instead for more modest changes aimed at uniquely tailoring the guidelines for Wisconsin schools.

After a series of public hearings, Republicans who control the Assembly study committee said they wanted to see more done to protect privacy and put in place a periodic review. However, they stopped short of suggesting Wisconsin should completely abandon the voluntary standards covering English and math currently used by 45 states.

A report with lawmakers’ recommendations is expected to be done by the end of the year.

The goal of the standards, which backers say has been achieved, was to improve instruction and better prepare students for life after school. But critics, many of them conservative Republicans, say the standards are too weak and amount to the federal government creating a national curriculum.

While Gov. Scott Walker has said he would like to see Wisconsin adopt tougher standards, he hasn’t outlined what he’d like to see changed. Republicans on the Assembly committee largely agreed Tuesday that too much time and money have gone into the standards now to completely undo them, while they also said they could be improved.

“We should take care to remember these standards are a floor, not a ceiling,” said Rep. Dean Knudson, R-Hudson.

State Superintendent Tony Evers, who signed a proclamation adopting the standards for Wisconsin in 2010, has said any attempt to change them will end up in court because he believes the Legislature doesn’t have the authority to do it.

The standards have been in place for three years in Wisconsin, and school across the state have already spent about $25 million implementing them, making any significant change in direction difficult and expensive.

Many local school district superintendents and teachers came out in support of the Common Core standards at the hearings, saying they are an improvement over the state’s previous weaker standards.

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Opponents, many of them conservatives from the Tea Party movement, pushed for creation of the study committees that held hearings in Madison, Fond du Lac, Eau Claire and Wausau this fall.

More than 50 Common Core opponents, many of them representing Tea Party groups across the state, sent a letter Tuesday thanking the committee for its work, but not specifying what should be done next.

“We intend to remain vigilant with you until the right things have been done to protect against any curtailment of our children’s ability to learn,” the letter said.

Some Democratic critics have also expressed concerns over the standards leading to a reduction in the teaching of other subjects like music, history and science. But it’s the Republicans who have started a national movement to dismantle the standards, in part over concerns that it’s leading to a national curriculum with not enough local control.

The Republican National Committee in April adopted a resolution calling the standards an inappropriate overreach. Movements to slow the standards down began in nearly a dozen states this year.

Education experts long advocated for voluntary national standards, leading to development of the Common Core by a national group of state school officials under the leadership of the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers.

Wisconsin’s nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau has described the Common Core standards as being “more rigorous, cohesive and specific” than what the state had in place before adoption.

New state tests to determine how well public school students are being taught are scheduled to be aligned with the standards starting in the 2014 school year.